Covey - The 7 habits of highly effective people

problem-solving"

problem-solving" techniques that focus on personality and truncate the vital character base. Let's now focus on each of the Public Victory habits in depth. 127

Habit 4: Think Win-Win TM -- Principles of Interpersonal Leadership We have committed the Golden Rule to memory; let us now commit it to life. -- Edwin Markha * * One time I was asked to work with a company whose president was very concerned about the lack of cooperation among his people. "Our basic problem, Stephen, is that they're selfish," he said. "They just won't cooperate. I know if they would cooperate, we could produce so much more. Can you help us develop a human-relations program that will solve the problem?" "Is your problem the people or the paradigm?" I asked. "Look for yourself," he replied. So I did. And I found that there was a real selfishness, and unwillingness to cooperate, a resistance to authority, defensive communication. I could see that overdrawn Emotional Bank Accounts had created a culture of low trust. But I pressed the question. "Let's look at it deeper," I suggested. "Why don't your people cooperate? What is the reward for not cooperating?" "There's no reward for not cooperating," he assured me. "The rewards are much greater if they do cooperate. "Are they?" I asked. Behind a curtain on one wall of this man's office was a chart. On the chart were a number of racehorses all lined up on a track. Superimposed on the face of each horse was the face of one of his managers. At the end of the track was a beautiful travel poster of Bermuda, an idyllic picture of blue skies and fleecy clouds and a romantic couple walking hand in hand down a white sandy beach. Once a week, this man would bring all his people into this office and talk cooperation. "Let's all work together. We'll all make more money if we do." Then he would pull the curtain and show them the chart. "Now which of you is going to win the trip to Bermuda?" It was like telling one flower to grow and watering another, like saying "firings will continue until morale improves." He wanted cooperation. He wanted his people to work together, to share ideas, to all benefit from the effort. But he was setting them up in competition with each other. One manager's success meant failure for the other managers As with many, many problems between people in business, family, and other relationships, the problem in this company was the result of a flawed paradigm. The president was trying to get the fruits of cooperation from a paradigm of competition. And when it didn't work, he wanted a technique, a program, a quick-fix antidote to make his people cooperate. 128